At the beginning of April Rusty had his surgery to remove some
of the hardware in his back. This had been scheduled to happen in December but
then Dr. Reichman got Covid the morning of the surgery. We did it April 2, and
I was nervous because he would be going under again and having his spine worked
on but it really was a straight forward process. I left the kids at home with
my parents and took Rusty to the hospital. We checked in and did all of the
testing and then went back to the pre-op area. Then I went home to feed Amelia
and by the time I came back he was already out of surgery and in the recovery room!
I waited about 30 minutes before they would let me see him and then about an
hour and a half later we got to go home. It was crazy! In the months since (I’m
writing this in June) we are so grateful that he did that surgery. He doesn’t
have back pain anymore and can roll around and play on the ground with the
kids. The nurse in the recovery room was totally hitting on Rusty right in
front of me! It was the weirdest thing, but it sure made Rusty feel good about
himself haha.
Easter festivities this year included the Red Sign Easter Egg Hunt, where they have thousands of eggs filled with toys and candies. You also got a coupon for the food trucks there. We opted to go with Jursassic Taco, and got the taco they are famous for- IT WAS DELICIOUS! Seriously, it was so good. Then after that we wandered around and let the kids do some crafts before we went up and ate the picnic that I had packed and listened to the second session of general conference there while we could see the Mount Timpanogos temple. After that we went home and I tied some of the donuts that my parents got for Rusty’s surgery onto strings and hung them from the back porch. The kids loved trying to eat them without touching them and I think that this might be a new Easter tradition!
The next day we had the kids find their Easter baskets and told the story of Easter by having the kids open up the Easter eggs with certain objects inside of each one. They had a lot of fun hunting around trying to find their baskets! Then after church we went to the Bartons to color eggs, do another little egg hunt, and I brought the extra donuts for them to do the donut on a string game too. It was a great time!
This month we saw some more cool people for story time, including Loki and Thor and Aladdin and Jasmine. The kids were so excited, and Della particularly loved seeing Jasmine.
I had heard about a cool park over in Saratoga Springs a few
times, but it just seemed so far to drive out there. Bryndee wanted to meet up
and let the kids play and so I decided that we should try out this new park and
I’m so glad we did! It is all themed like baseball, and there are even little
batting cages all around the park. The kids loved it and thought it was a
blast.
I spent a lot of time in April gardening and getting the garden free of weeds and all perfect for planting, and I planted things in the garden box down in the yard. This is all a bummer because then we kept going out of town and I always forgot to water things so now (in June) everything is dead haha. But I did put a lot of work and effort into getting it all ready. Next year.
Henry started soccer this month! It was so fun to watch him really progress and get better throughout his season. We didn’t work with him or teach him, and they didn’t have practices, but Henry really does have a natural talent for soccer and did really well. Even his coaches told us that he was doing great and seemed to have a knack for it! Henry really loves soccer and is so good at it! I'm biased and whatever, but he is so talented and it is so fun to watch him succeed! He's the cutest little soccer player. In the fall I'll get him in a different league that maybe does practices.
Della started dance classes this month too! I know it’s crazy to have the kids doing their activities at the same time, but I found a new teacher that I wanted to take her to and the recital was May 5 with another recital at the beginning of June. We decided we would have her do dance for two months just like Henry was doing soccer for two months. I didn’t get to watch Della’s classes like before, but the teacher told me that she was really impressed with Della and that she had a lot of natural talent!
One Saturday we decided to all get dressed up, Henry was a prince, the girls were princesses, Rusty was a knight, and I was a unicorn, and we all had a little tea party. The knight poured the tea and it was all very posh and fancy. Adeline was thrilled with it and Henry was happy as long as he got to eat the cookies haha.
Rusty has been really stressed with work lately, and has been going on lots of work trips and working out some new business acquisitions and strategies. He is killing it, but he is always so hard on himself. I wanted to do something nice for him and so I told him that we were going to the Bartons for dinner one night and then surprised him with a date! We walked into their house and then I said, “Ok Babe, let’s go!” He was so confused haha. Because of his surgery, we couldn’t do anything physical like rock climbing, mini golf, go karting, etc. So I had to think outside the box and do something we don’t normally do and we ended up going to a café in Provo where they have board games for you to play. It was actually so much fun! We played Code Names while we ate dinner and then we played a Utah version of Monopoly while we had dessert. I had never played Monopoly before so it was pretty fun to do that together. We had a great time! I love going on dates with him!
This month I was still working on finishing up my 30 before 30 projects, and one of them was to make something with clay. I had envisioned doing something with the pottery wheel, but when Desi was showing me around her studio I saw these beautiful white trays and I said, “Someday I want to make these. This is my end goal.” And she just laughed and said that we could totally make them today. So we did! I cut the clay and rolled it flat, put it over the molds, and made some imprints. I’ll come back later to glaze it. It was really fun to make them and I feel like there is something therapeutic in that work.
For part of a week Rusty was out of town, so I went to my parents’ house and we stayed there for a day or two before we went to Park City. They had gotten a condo there and had invited us to go and stay with them, so it worked out pretty well! One of our days in Park City we went for a walk on the little trail right by the condo while the kids rode their bikes. Della went down a hill too fast and fell and got a big bump on her head. She was a little nervous after that to ride her bike, but after a few weeks she was fine again. We walked over to a little café and got some yummy hot chocolate and treats! Another day we went and saw a movie, Raya and the Lost Dragon. Luckily for us we had the entire theater to ourselves because Amelia just babbled the entire time and would yell sounds at the screen haha. Henry and Della loved the movie, especially Henry. The only problem was that Henry had a soccer game at 9:00 AM on Saturday morning, so we had to get up early and be on the road to make it back to Orem for that. But my parents came for that too so that was fun for Henry!
While we were in Morgan, my dad had to go to the Young Women’s
activity because they had asked him to teach self defense. My mom suggested
that Henry go with Dad and have some special one on one time, and I thought
that was a great idea. I feel like lately he has been feeling a little
overlooked with Rusty travelling and just still adjusting to having three kids.
So I asked Henry and he was psyched about it! He came back after the activity
and I asked him how it was and he said, “Oh it was good. There was a really
yummy peanut butter treat that you would have loved! There were also some scary
stories. Like a story about two sisters that got taken in a van and the older
one broke out of the van and ran away but the younger one was too scared and
stayed in the van and then later they found her dead.” I was like WHAT?!?!?! I
just stared at Dad and his eyes were big and he just said, “I didn’t really
think about that…” I asked Henry what else he learned and he had so many things
like, you shouldn’t have a gun because the bad guy will just take it and shoot
you with it, you should act like a scalded cat to scare them away, the Gerber Slap
you use on really bad people and you hit the back of their neck and you get 7
seconds to run away… and more like that. I was nervous that this would be a big
issue later, because Henry really does have anxiety and gets scared pretty
easily, but we tried to focus on how now he was prepared and didn’t have to be
so nervous because he would know what to do. Later, these things come up kind
of randomly. Like he was talking about how this kid at nature school was being
mean (he was a jerk) and he said, “I wish I had known to be like a scalded cat when
he did that! I bet Oliver would have been really surprised!” and then he
laughed haha. He also brings up giving people a gerber slap sometimes. This
kid.
After Rusty got back we had made plans with the Bartons to go on a date in Heber with them. They told us that they would have their kids with them, but I had already asked my parents to watch the kids while they were in Park City and we never get to go on dates so we cancelled with the Bartons and went out on a date just us! We went and got sushi (and pretended we were walruses), walked around downtown a little bit, and then went to a cute little coffee shop and got yummy desserts. Mom helped Henry make something from the new cookbook that she bought him and he was so proud of himself! He really does enjoy cooking!
Towards the end of April we went and saw the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point. The tulips were out in full bloom and it was such a beautiful day weather wise! The kids loved the flowers, especially sweet Henry, and they loved walking through the gardens. Mom and Dad came with us too!
Henry's Highlights
- Started soccer!
- He is in a phase where everything is literal and has to be 100% correct. "Give me one second Henry." "One alligator. OKAY MOM!"
- Henry gets scared really easily, and is scared of pretty much everything. He doesn't want to go to the bathroom alone, which is like ten steps away from the kitchen.
- He LOVES reading! He is insatiable with read alouds, and is even starting to enjoy reading all by himself.
- Henry put his shirt on backwards on accident. Ironically, it
Adeline's Adventures
- Started dance!
- Still sings all the time. I will be sad when this stops, even if sometimes I tell her she needs to sing in a different room or outside. She does make up her own words now and just sings about random things or things she's doing. Often she sings about her mom and dad dying and that makes me a little nervous.
- She is never growing up. She has told me that multiple times and she will not let it go. I try to trick her and just ask things like, " What do you want to be when you grow up?" "Ugh mom, I'm never growing up remember?!" She wants to stay little forever and I don't disagree.
Amelia's Updates
- Lia started making hissing sounds
- Is sitting up like a champ!
- Loves the little unicorn llama toy the Easter Bunny brought
- Yells a lot. Not mad or sad, just yelling
- She eats ALL THE TIME. She is always down to eat and is a little chubbawubba. Her shorts don't fit around her legs haha
- First time in a cart! We went to Costco
- She LOVES her mobile. Like gets the biggest smile and is so happy when I turn it on
- Her favorite is when I sing, "There was a farmer who had a dog and Bingo was his name-o". She stops crying and starts smiling right away
No comments:
Post a Comment